Seasons 4 Growth

Here's a fun idea for Summer! Have you ever made slime? How about therapy putty?
Here are a bunch of play dough recipes that we love: https://www.theottoolbox.com/best-dough-recipes/

Including our famous crayon play dough: https://www.theottoolbox.com/crayon-play-dough-recipes/

What can we add to this image about common working memory struggles? Here is information and tools to support this area: https://www.theottoolbox.com/how-to-improve-working-memory/

Here’s to growth in 2024!

My hopes for you in the new year! 🎉 Thank you for all you’ve done to make 2023 a great year for me. It’s been a long time since I looked back on a year and felt happiness, and I owe a lot of that to you.

Thank you for supporting my work, for leaving such kind and encouraging comments, and for simply being here. You inspire me to keep doing what I do and I’m so grateful for you, always. 🩷

Are you new to special education or wondering if your child may be eligible? Learn how to get started with this three-part virtual workshop series. Visit PACER.org/workshops for descriptions and registration.

Great activities for the summer!

Good stuff emilysresilientreaders!

SO MANY BENEFITS TO PLAYING THE PIANO AND OTHER MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS

Visuals help everyone!

WHY VISUALS ARE SO IMPORTANT FOR THE LEARNING PROCESS

Most kids are visual learners. Here are the benefits of providing more visual experiences for your child's learning development.

North Shore Physical Therapy

What a great resource!

Reframing Autism is pleased to introduce Autism Essentials - our free, self-paced online course that provides a neuro-affirming understanding of Autism.

Check it out here: https://reframing-autism-s-school.teachable.com/p/autism-essentials

This course is designed for a wide variety of lived experiences as well as different levels of pre-existing knowledge about Autism - from those that are totally new to the topic to those that have formal education in Autism.

Whether you are Autistic, formally diagnosed, self-identified or think you might be Autistic, a family member or loved one of an Autistic person, a researcher, teacher, other professional, or ally, we hope you learn something new or deepen and extend your existing knowledge of Autism and the Autistic community.

The course focuses on five main areas:
• Language
• What Is Autism?
• Brain Differences
• Communication and Socialising
• Thinking and Processing

All learners access the same base information in the course, but each topic has multiple worksheets available for different levels of knowledge about Autism. You can choose to complete the level that best fits your knowledge to customise your learning in a way that works for you.

Image description: The Reframing Autism logo is on a dusty rose background with the text: Reframing Autism is excited to present our free online self-paced course Autism Essentials, followed by https://reframing-autism-s-school.teachable.com/p/autism-essentials

This is important to remember and consider, especially for our neurodivergent learners! Too much stress negatively impacts learning!

This Stress Performance Curve is based on Yerkes-Dodson Law. It shows us that we generally perform better when we’re under an optimal level of stress. When it comes to getting things done we have to have enough “stress” to create drive. This encourages us to get things done. Too much stress and we burn out and too little stress and we don’t have the ability to get going.

When you’re under-stressed, it means that you’re not being challenged. When there’s no challenge there’s no drive to get something done. It’s very much a “why bother?” attitude.

That’s why many of us thrive in challenging careers or when doing work that we love.

When we’re in optimal stress we feel motivated but not so much that we’re overwhelmed. We want to stay around the middle where “good stress” makes us feel creative and focused. This is when we feel like we have just enough work to keep us busy but not enough that we feel like we can’t get it done.

When you’re constantly stuck in the high-stress zone, you’ll find that all stress is bad stress because you’re already at your max capacity. Even if there’s nothing you can do about your stress levels (because sometimes there isn’t) it’s important to keep an eye on where you’re at and do what you can to get to that optimal level, or a lower level (we can’t always be productive and that’s absolutely okay!)

Where do you fall on the Stress Performance Curve today?